Brave Story

  The girl sighed again. “Why Vision, of course. Not that that word means anything to you now.”

  No, no it doesn’t.

  “In any case, I’m your friend, Wataru. If you can make it over here, I can help you out in lots of ways. Please, try to find another way into Vision. I know you can do it.”

  Wataru started to wonder if he was dreaming. Maybe the shock of the phone call had knocked him out. That had to be it.

  Wataru didn’t tell Kuniko about the phone call from the other woman.

  His mom already seemed tired enough as it was. He wondered where she had been out shopping, because when she came home after the long summer day, her shoes were worn and caked with grit.

  That night, when Kuniko fell asleep, Wataru snuck outside.

  He didn’t know where he was going at first. He walked aimlessly, gazing up at the night sky, thinking maybe he would cool off a bit before going back home. He could go to the park and ride on all the swings. He could do whatever he wanted, anything to get his mind off the earlier events of the day.

  As he walked he had an idea. I know, I’ll go see Katchan. Summer vacation was the day after tomorrow. Mr. and Mrs. Komura would undoubtedly allow him to stay. Then they could play Streetfighter Zero III all night. His mom wouldn’t get mad at him for staying at Katchan’s, either. Not now.

  He walked, slowly formulating his plan, and when he looked up again he noticed that he was standing in front of the haunted Daimatsu building. Trees at the Mihashi Shrine swayed back and forth in the thick summer night air.

  This isn’t the way to Katchan’s. Why did I come here? He had a funny feeling that someone had called him here.

  Someone was inside the building—behind the wall of hanging tarps. It was more than one or two people. They were talking in hushed voices. Actually, they were arguing.

  Wataru lifted up a stretch of tarp and slid quickly inside. He immediately bumped into a pair of grimy legs and feet wearing rubber flip-flops.

  “Whoa! What the—who’s he?!”

  The owner of the legs cried out and stumbled back, then lashed out with a foot. Wataru quickly rolled away so as not to be stepped on, but he was too late. A well-aimed kick caught him in the side at full force, knocking the wind out of him. Everything went white.

  “One of your friends?” Wataru heard someone saying through a haze of pain. He clung to consciousness for dear life.

  “Don’t tell me you called him to help?”

  “Not much of a backup, heh.”

  Gradually, the world came back into focus. His side smarted where he had been kicked, and he felt nauseated, but he still managed to sit up.

  The area inside the tarps was lit by a large flashlight. The bright light made the shadows of everyone inside long and dark, more real than the people who cast them.

  There were three others besides Wataru inside the building. The one holding the flashlight was Joto Elementary’s very own Kenji Ishioka, scourge of the sixth grade. It took a nanosecond for Wataru to identify the other two kids. They were Kenji’s ever-present goons.

  Wataru shook his head and forced his eyes to focus. That’s when he realized that a fourth person was also present. This unlucky soul was on the ground with his face pressed into the dirt. One of Kenji’s boys was on his back, grinding a knee into his spine.

  Most of his face was obscured by a sticky patch of duct tape, but it was still clear who it was.

  “Ah!” Wataru yelped, the effort sending a stab of pain through his side. He clutched at his belly with both hands.

  Pressed to the ground, his mouth wrapped in tape, and one of the Ishioka gang pressing him into the dirt, was Mitsuru. His eyes were opened wide as he looked back at Wataru. He was asking something. He wanted something.

  “Wh-what do you think you’re doing?!” Wataru said. He meant for it to be a shout, but he was afraid it would hurt his side too much, so the words came out in little more than a hoarse whisper.

  Kenji and his pals laughed until they were practically rolling on the ground. It was harsh, evil laughter. They’ll hear you outside. What about the nice priest at Mihashi Shrine, where is he?

  “You’re a funny guy, you know that?” one of them said.

  “What are you doing?” Kenji parroted with a sneer.

  Wataru found himself unable to stand, so he got up on his knees. Slowly, he was able to move forward on his knee toward the spot where Mitsuru was lying. One of Kenji’s crew took a step in Wataru’s direction, and kicked him swiftly on the side of the head, sending him sprawling on the ground with a loud thud.

  Why aren’t any grown-ups coming to help? Can’t they hear all the noise they’re making in here?

  “Bull’s-eye!”

  “A perfect headshot, that one.”

  “Let me take a swing. Gotta practice!”

  Wataru tried to sit up and lurch aside to avoid the next blow, but his head rattled and his eyes spun. He took the knee square in the back.

  Collapsing on the ground, he came face-to-face with Mitsuru. Their eyes locked.

  Wataru clung to the edge of consciousness. He felt no pain. He felt nothing but a low burning sensation, like a bad fever. His vision narrowed, and he couldn’t tell up from down. All he could see were Mitsuru’s big black eyes staring into his own. Somehow, that powerful gaze gave Wataru an anchor, something to cling to, a life rope thrown to a tiny craft on the choppy seas of awareness.

  He’s trying to tell me something —his mouth is moving beneath the tape.

  —Take it off.

  You want me to take off the tape?

  —Take it off, quick!

  Kenji chortled triumphantly and slammed a foot down on Wataru’s backside, causing him to bounce. He moved his right hand a little bit.

  —That’s right, use your hand, take it off.

  But I’m losing it. I can’t—I can’t breathe.

  Unbelievably, Wataru saw his right hand move of its own accord, inching toward the tape covering Mitsuru’s mouth.

  A shadow flew over his head, and Kenji’s bodyslam scored a direct hit. Wataru was pressed to the ground, and he was afraid his ribs would snap.

  “Crunch!” came Kenji’s literal battle cry.

  Who knew why they brought Mitsuru here in the first place, or what they wanted from him? It was clear they had forgotten that themselves, but now that they had started playing there was no stopping them. The brakes are off. They might even kill us.

  Wataru’s right hand moved again, grabbing the edge of the tape.

  I bet it’ll smart if I just rip it off.

  He thought for an instant, but his hand moved from right to left without hesitation, ripping off a piece of tape. He took off one layer, then another.

  “Hey, what’re you doing?!” said one of Kenji’s friends when he saw Wataru’s hand move. But before he could do anything, Wataru pulled the last piece of tape off Mitsuru’s mouth—a sticky mass of goo stuck to his fingers.

  Mitsuru’s eyes shone darkly. His swollen, bloodied lips opened, and he spoke.

  “Great lord of the Underworld, by the Pact I call upon thee. Winged kin of darkness and the dead, by the promise of blood, black and ancient, I summon…”

  Suddenly, the flashlight in Kenji’s hand went out.

  “Whoa! Wh-what the…?!”

  Kenji staggered back, his shadow wavering on the tarp behind him.

  His shadow. Even though the flashlight had gone out, it was strangely bright inside the tarps. He could see everyone’s faces even more clearly than before.

  Mitsuru’s voice continued in a rhythmic chant. The words were clear, crystalline.

  His voice—it’s beautiful.

  “To those who oppose me grant the eternal sleep of death, and in ice unmelting bind them. Sacuroz, helgis, metos, helgitos! Come, Balbylone, Daughter of Darkness!” he was saying. The words were like a spell, and when he was finished, Wataru realized why it was so bright. The ground surrounded by the boys was shining white, casting a pale glo
w on the space inside the haunted building.

  What’s going on?!

  The glowing area was a circle, a little smaller than a manhole. As he watched, it seemed to rise, swelling. It was almost like something was being born from the ground.

  That’s impossible.

  The otherwise firm-packed dirt looked, in that one shining circle, to be as malleable as clay. And there he saw a head—a person’s head—emerging. First the top of the head, and the neck, then shoulders, and the chest with two arms folded across it. It was a slender body, lined in graceful curves.

  A woman.

  It was a female mannequin made of the darkest, blackest clay.

  Kenji and the two others stood with their mouths open, trembling. The dark figure emerging from the ground spread her arms. She was facing Mitsuru. Her breasts were bared for them to see, yet they too were as dark as night.

  Then, two eyes split the smooth featureless face—eyes of gold, without a trace of white. The only sign of pupils were thin, jet black lines running through their middle. Like the eyes of a panther.

  “Welcome, Balbylone,” Mitsuru sang, his face bright. He lifted his head as high as he could from where he lay upon the ground. “I bring sacrifices…sacrifices to your beauty.”

  Hands still spread, the dark mannequin turned to face Kenji and his gang. They crouched stupidly, unable to scream or even run.

  From the tips of the mannequin’s fingers, long sharp claws began to grow. At the same time, two black wings, darker still than her body, spread from her back.

  Wataru turned his head to stare at the unbelievable sight before his eyes. He wasn’t sure whether to be terrified or overjoyed, but before he knew it, he was smiling. He said nothing, and grinned so wide he looked nothing so much like the Cheshire cat from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

  The strange dark woman that Mitsuru called Balbylone walked on long slender legs, advancing toward Kenji and his friends step by step. Her wings had spread to their full span of more than six feet. The claws on her hands were hooked, and they made a clicking noise as she swung them gracefully through the air.

  Kenji’s group backed up until they hit the far wall of the building. No place left to run, they clung to one another and, like Wataru, stared at the otherworldly creature. They were all pale, their faces bone white, eyes open wide, jaws hanging slack. They looked stricken with fear, and yet at the same time, they seemed strangely happy.

  Wataru was looking at the back of Balbylone, while everyone else was staring at her face. Kenji was transfixed as he gazed upon her face—his mouth opening and closing without a sound. But in reality, he was saying something that nobody could hear. His voice was too low, and besides, Balbylone’s claws were going…

  Snick. Snick.

  Wataru suddenly wanted to see her face. What does she look like now? Is she smiling? Are her golden eyes staring at Kenji?

  “Okay…” Kenji muttered vacantly, “I’ll go.”

  It sounded as if he were answering a question, like Balbylone had asked him, “Will you come with me?” But no one had said anything. Kenji’s lost it.

  Kenji’s face melted into a broad smile. Then he stood up, swaying unsteadily, and began to walk toward Balbylone. His gang remained behind, clinging to one another for dear life, unable to wrest their eyes from Kenji. Their mouths trembled.

  “K-Kenji!” one said in a voice like a sob. “N-no! Don’t go!”

  Kenji heard nothing. He saw nothing. He only stared stupidly up at Balbylone, walking until he stood right before her. There, he dropped to his knees, and spread his arms. “I’ll go…”

  Balbylone lifted her shoulders. The movement spread down her arms, and then down to the tips of her wings, until her whole jet black body rippled and shook. Somehow, with utter confidence, Wataru knew what was going on. Ecstasy. She’s trembling with ecstasy. Like a beast of prey the second before it makes a kill.

  Her wings extended outward with a taut snap, and like a switch had been thrown, the smile faded from Kenji’s face.

  Then he screamed. It was a scream beyond conscious thought, beyond his ability to control—a raw, primal scream.

  Balbylone launched at him. Two slender black arms writhed like serpents, encircling his body. For a moment, she seemed to be crouching before him, then her jet black head wavered and, like an amoeba, became formless, swelling to ten times its original size. Kenji, wrapped in her arms, was lifted into the air. Flipping him toward the top of her head, she swallowed him whole. Kenji’s scream cut off cleanly, as if snipped by a pair of scissors.

  One of his sneakers rolled to a stop by Wataru’s foot.

  Wataru’s eyes were stretched open wide. All he could see was the expression of abject terror on Kenji’s face the moment before she swallowed him, his last milliseconds of life replaying in crystal-clear slow motion, frame by frame.

  After she swallowed Kenji, Balbylone’s head immediately shrank to its regular size and shape, and she was once again a goddess of ebony beauty. Her nails clicked and pointed at the remaining hoodlums in front of her.

  “No way!” they screamed.

  Balbylone flew soundlessly with a single beat of her wings, and scooped them up from where they huddled. Wataru could see their legs jutting out from beneath her wings, futilely kicking at the air.

  A gust of wind like a cyclone passed over Wataru’s head. Even though he was lying down, Wataru closed his eyes and clung to the ground, feeling as though he might be lifted away at any moment. Then, just like that, it was over.

  Fearfully, he opened his eyes and lifted his head to find everything around him in darkness.

  From someplace far away, beyond the tarps, outside the haunted building, an intersection away, he heard someone gunning a car engine.

  Then a flashlight clicked on only a few feet away from his hand. The bright light hurt his eyes. A hand touched him on the shoulder.

  “You all right?”

  It was Mitsuru. His face looked terrible. His lip was cut. A line of blood trickled from his right nostril. Yet he moved smoothly and competently, helping Wataru up.

  Wataru sat up, and suddenly felt quite dizzy. Then he was lurching backward, sticking out his arms to catch himself. Every bone in his body ached, but the sensation of pain seemed somehow distant, like his body wasn’t entirely his own.

  Beside him, Mitsuru sat on one knee, rubbing a fist below his nose.

  “Wh-where’d they go?” Wataru managed to ask. There was an unfamiliar, acrid taste in his mouth. Maybe it was blood.

  “They?” echoed Mitsuru, raising an eyebrow.

  “Kenji…and his idiot friends,” Wataru said, looking up at him. He felt dizzy again, and his vision blurred. He tried to read Mitsuru’s expression, but he couldn’t get his eyes to focus.

  “They went bye-bye. Hard,” he said with a wry grin. “Can you stand?”

  Wataru’s legs felt like rubber. Still, he tried to get up. His sneakers scraped uselessly at the ground.

  “What happened to them?” he asked again. “Where did they go? What was that just now? That creature—the dark woman.”

  Somehow it all felt unreal. He heard himself saying things he didn’t entirely understand, then his voice trailed off like someone talking in their sleep.

  “There’s no monster,” Mitsuru said quietly and assuredly, using the same voice he used when he answered the teacher’s questions in cram school. “You were dreaming. It’s nothing. Just a dream.”

  “It’s not a dream,” Wataru said, with much more confidence than he felt. Unable to stand, his body swayed, and he fell to the ground once again. Or he would have, if Mitsuru hadn’t caught him at the last moment.

  “Why did you come here?”

  “Huh? Why…”

  “I didn’t call for you,” Mitsuru spat. He sounded upset.

  “I don’t know. I just came…”

  “You came even though I didn’t call for you—you have nothing to do with this…” Then, suddenly, Mitsuru smiled. ??
?But you saved me.”

  What is he talking about?

  “You really are a handful,” Mitsuru said, and he mumbled something under his breath. It sounded like another spell. Wataru felt a warm white light spill down on him from above. The light wrapped around his body, suffusing him, and unbelievably, the pain began to fade. It felt good.

  He looked up in a daze to see Mitsuru waving.

  So long. Goodbye.

  And Wataru slept.

  When his eyes opened, he was lying in his own bed and the alarm clock was ringing.

  It was seven in the morning. He wouldn’t have believed the clock if he didn’t see the morning sunlight spilling through the checkered curtains of his room.

  It was already getting warm, and his pajamas clung to his body.

  “Wataru, time to get up!” he heard Kuniko shout from outside his door. She was knocking at the door now. “Don’t be late on the last day of school! You’ll be the laughingstock of your class!”

  The last day of school.

  Wataru cradled his head in his hands. He was here. His head was on his shoulders. He blinked his eyes. He could see. He could smell. Mom was frying an egg in the kitchen.

  But what was that? What did I see last night?

  Was I dreaming?

  Did I stay in last night? Did I only think I had gone out, while I was really here under the covers? Was I only dreaming that I wanted to sneak out to Katchan’s house?

  And what was that—that monster?

  His memory was foggy, but some details were clear. Mitsuru, and the jet black creature in the form of a winged woman. Those golden eyes. The snick snick of hooked claws.

  Kenji Ishioka screaming.

  Wataru rolled out of his room and into the living room. Kuniko, about to set a piece of toast on his plate, gave a startled cry.

  “Wh-what is it? What’s wrong?”

  “Mom, I…”

  “What, Wataru?”

  Wataru’s shoulders sagged. He couldn’t tell her. He couldn’t put what he’d seen into words. No way. Not going to happen. Impossible.

  “Don’t tell me you were still dreaming?” Kuniko said with a smile, picking up the piece of toast from where she had dropped it on the table. “Go wash your face. Why, you’re covered in sweat.”